Wednesday, April 13, 2005

News Bits

DALLAS -- A set of numerals written on the back of a dead man's hand turned out to be a license plate number that led police to his suspected killers. Police noticed the numbers as they looked over the body of 18-year-old Francisco Lopez, who was shot near his home on Sunday.

On Saturday night, Lopez had noticed a blue Monte Carlo cruising around his home. Lopez thought the men riding in it might try to steal his Cadillac, so he wrote their car's license plate number on his hand, police said.

The next day, Lopez and his girlfriend were returning home when Lopez saw the car again, confronted the men and was shot to death, police said. Brothers Javier Izaguirre, 21, and Reymundo Izaguirre, 20, were arrested and charged with murder.

This somewhat goes back to my monday post about fighting back, being aware of what's going on, and doing something about crime. This victim paid attention and used his head and even though he was killed, the two cockroaches who did it are behind bars now.

Parole violators will be sent back to prison rather than to drug treatment programs or home detention beginning Monday under a sweeping change to California's troubled parole system.

State corrections officials said they decided to do away with diversion programs that served as an alternative to prison because there was no evidence the lesser sanctions work. The policy had been pushed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration as a way to rehabilitate ex-convicts and to save money by reducing the prison population. In his weekly radio address, Schwarzenegger stressed the state's concern and aid for crime victims after his administration abandoned the program, which wasunder fire from crime victims' advocates and parole agents.

The Los Angeles Times reported Saturday that the Schwarzenegger administration had dropped a program that allowed jail-based drug treatment, halfway house programs or home detention with electronic monitoring as an alternative to prison for some low-level parole violators.

The state adopted the alternative programs under former Gov. Gray Davis and expanded them about a year ago after a nonpartisan watchdog agency called the state's parole system "a billion-dollar failure" because 67 percent of ex- convicts returned to prison.

Gee, another feel-good-do-nothing program bites the dust. And what a shock it was a Republican who had to clean up an expensive and useless mess made by a Democrat. What do you want to bet that Governor Arnold will be called "insensitive" and "anti-rehab" and "typical Republican jerk"? Never mind that it was an ineffective program that wasted valuable resources. "Oh it's always about money with you Republicans... what about humanity? What about giving people a second chance?"

Not interested, because in this case, the criminal has squandered his second chance. No need to waste the money. Let's spend it on researching alternative energy. That'll be a little more useful.